Main menu

Main menu

College Football Analysis: Bill O'Brien Southern Recruiting Strategy

March 5, 2012
| by

0 0

Our friends over at Leather Helmet Blog caught an interesting tidbit of information from the Atlanta Journal Constitution. The purpose of the AJC column was discussing Penn State's stated intentions of recruiting more from the south under Bill O'Brien.

O'Brien already plucked a quarterback out of Georgia as a late pick-up in the Class of 2012 (Steven Bench) and already has a quarterback from Virginia lined up for 2013 (Christian Hackenberg).

“To be honest with you, we feel great about where we’re at right now with recruiting," O'Brien said. "We’ve got a real good jump on next year’s class, and we feel like there’s a lot of people receiving us well out there, as it’s related to Penn State football.

Asked about the level of success he intends to have going toe-to-toe with the SEC schools in traditional SEC-country, O'Brien replied;

Popular Video

A police officer saw a young black couple drive by and pulled them over. What he did next left them stunned:

Popular Video

A police officer saw a young black couple drive by and pulled them over. What he did next left them stunned:

“All we’re going to do is go down there and talk about the things Penn State has to sell, which is academic diversity, a chance to play a great football schedule in front of 108,000 fans, and a great staff. We have guys on this staff that have won four national championships. So we have a lot to sell here. We have a great student body. We’re looking forward to getting out there and talking about Penn State as much as we can.”

O'Brien answered questions about the myth of a gentleman's agreement among Big Ten coaches in recruiting, which Urban Meyer has been under some fire for violating depending on who you speak to, and what his pitch is to student athletes form Georgia. But it is his response to the idea of oversigning that has caught the attention of Leather Helmet Blog.

"We’re in the process of evaluating our roster right now," O'Brien said. "We’re trying to get a real hold on what exactly our needs are for next year. And then, at that point, we’ll make a decision on whether we’ll do what you’re talking about. There’s some definite advantages in doing that. Right now, we haven’t made a decision on whether we’re headed in that direction.”

You may have noticed that nowhere did O'Brien turn down the idea. In fact it comes off as though he embraces the possibility.

What are your thoughts on oversigning? If Penn State started to utilize this "strategy," would you be in support of it, or would you prefer somebody monitor the recruiting process and enforce a different philosophy?